Overview
- The Sami Rohr Prize selected Israeli reporter Amir Tibon as this year’s winner for The Gates of Gaza and the award carries a $100,000 cash prize to be presented at a ceremony in Jerusalem.
- The Gates of Gaza is a first-person memoir that recounts Tibon, his wife and their two young daughters hiding for roughly ten hours in their Kibbutz Nahal Oz safe room during the October 7 attacks.
- Tibon’s book describes his father, a retired IDF major general, driving from Tel Aviv to rescue the family, helping others along the route and confronting armed assailants.
- The book has already won major honors including the 2024 National Jewish Book Award, the Wingate Prize and the Bernstein Prize, and the Rohr Prize adds to that recognition.
- Tibon said the prize’s mission is vital as writers and readers face rising antisemitism, and the award highlights how frontline survivor testimony is shaping public memory and debate about Gaza policy.